Stock markets choppy; investors focus on corporate earnings

MUMBAI (Reuters) - India's stock markets seesawed on Tuesday, struggling to snap a three-day losing streak, with investors unwilling to make any risky bets and the markets firmly focussing on corporate earnings.

Gains in financial and industrial stocks slightly edged out losses in consumer discretionary and telecommunications stocks.

Indian stocks also received some support from their Asian peers, which rose from the day's lows on Tuesday as Chinese shares seesawed after Beijing scrambled to prop them up while some investors took shelter from market volatility in safe-haven assets such as government bonds and the Japanese yen.

"Quarterly results are the ones that will give direction to the market. China and Europe would be in focus as parliament is not functioning," UR Bhat, managing director at Dalton Capital in Mumbai said.

 

The BSE Sensex was down 0.44 percent, while the Nifty fell 0.36 percent.

Maruti Suzuki was up 0.5 percent after reporting quarterly profit that increased 56 percent but was slightly below bullish analysts' estimates.

Shares of Punjab National Bank spiked 6.7 percent as the bank's bad loan ratio fell marginally in the three months to June.

Union Bank of India also gained 3 percent after reporting a smaller-than-expected fall in quarterly profit.

Meanwhile, Bank of India's shares slumped 3 percent after its net profit tumbled.

Large caps HDFC Bank gained 1.6 percent, Reliance rose about 1 percent while

Glenmark Pharmaceuticals was down 3.37 percent after a U.S. court ruled that the Indian drugmaker's generic Finacea, infringed Bayer AG's patent.

(Reporting by Karen Rebelo; Editing by Anand Basu)